Michael Sam Says He Is Gay; May Become First Publicly Gay Player in N.F.L.

6'2, 255 according to http://www.mutigers.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/michael_sam_452639.html

Maybe he's 6'1, 250. Let's not mince inches and pounds.

Undersized. Yeah, that's what he is.

Hasn't shown he can drop back into coverage? Really? He's a defensive end. I want him hunting the QB.

 

Sam was 6-1 1/2, 260 at the Senior Bowl weigh-in, which is as official as it gets:

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/nfl-draft-scout/24414811/senior-bowl-official-weigh-ins

And as the Kiper story I linked a page or so back noted, he's too short to be a 4-3 defensive end, and too light to be a 3-4 defensive end.

Thus, he'll be a 3-4 outside linebacker. That means he'll have to show some cover skills to go before the third round.

Robert Mathis, the reigning NFL sack leader, is comparable in height and weight to Sam. And Mathis went in the fifth round.

 

He's an OLB.

It's perfectly legitimate to say, "I think that the guy has shown it on the field. I'd take him. I don't care about the measurables."

But it's not an outrage that NFL scouts have him going in the middle rounds. It's exactly where carbon copies of him have gone.

 

I don't think you'd find a 6-1 or 6-2 defensive end anywhere in football, Xan.

He's a pass-rushing linebacker -- as specialties go, that's a good one to have and stay in the league, but it's a specialty.

Mike Mayock had a good take on him, he is someone who can play well on all your special teams and in certain defensive situations but who won't be able to cover anybody. That's a third- to fifth-rounder.

 

Dick, do you think the NFL folks didn't know he was gay, or do you think they did know, and his draft prospects were unaffected?

 

I think that the scouting report on him seems to indicate third-to-fifth rounder.

And I think that nobody batted an eye about that projection until two nights ago, despite how glaringly unfair everyone suddenly seems to think it is.

There are a million men in this country who follow the NFL Draft obsessively. There are even more who follow the SEC obsessively.

And nobody raised an eyebrow.

 

My mistake on the DE thing. But "pass-rushing linebacker" isn't so far off from what I noticed when I watched. Seemed like he crept up on the edge quite a bit.

 

Third to fifth rounder was the scouting report.

The scouting report now is third to seventh rounder, maybe undrafted, with many anonymous football geniuses saying "he can't play and I would never take him."

 

And it's completely impossible that *anyone* would ever be "3rd to 5th round" at one point in the scouting process would turn into "3rd to 7th round, maybe UFA" at another point in the scouting process? Not even getting into different people having different opinions.

 

Right.

And YankeeFan thinks that the third-to-fifth round projection prior to his announcement was bullshit, too. Which I dispute.

As far as the drop to the seventh round? Well, like I've said, from about November to about March, everybody is a third to fifth rounder. It's the default report for guys like Sam who have to prove something at the Combine. Then, in about 10 seconds, everybody and their brother was examining him like a used car. And some scouts had to get real instead of just tossing out platitudes.

Watch ESPNU some time. There are probably 150 college basketball players going in the first round next year.

 

It will be all there for everyone to see in 2 weeks at combine. No sense speculating now. Things like the 40 time and bench are pretty much meaningless. What really counts for the scouts are the drills. I want to see how Sam moves latterly. Will be interesting to see if Sam is grouped with LB's or D Line.

As far as draft position a lot of good players have been in lower rounds. For example
look at The Seahawks- Sherman 5th, Chancellor 5th, Smith 7th.

In the end if Sam can play he'll be in the NFL. If he can't play he won't be
there as part of a social engineering experiment

 

But the funny thing is, there is no real scouting process right now. If he shows poorly at the combine, I can totally understand it. But there's nothing happening the last few weeks.